Wool 'n Word Ramblings

A Quick Note

  We had a wonderful dyeing day a couple of weeks ago and I started blogging about it while at the shop the other day and something happened - I don't remember what - so I never finished.  Jackie S. took lots of pictures so I'll do a full story on that soon.

 This is 4th of July weekend and the shop is closed 'cause business is usually a bust on holidays.  Our DD, DSL and DGD have been visiting from Toledo and it's been such a treat.  DGD, Erika, turned 1 on July 25 so we had a birthday party.

For her big day, she had her first chocolate ever!

 

After a wonderful week and a half, her mom and dad left because they're going to Guatamala on a medical missions trip.  We have sweet Erika until Sun. when our daughter, Katie, who has a 9 month old, Emma, picks her up and tries having 2 babies at her house!  So brave!!.  We'll be available to either  come back from camp or (once we get home on Wed. evening) do rescue.

  On the 14th we'll drive Erika to Buffalo to meet her mom who'll drive from Toledo and the same day our daughter and grandaughter from Texas will be arriving - we think in the evening.  On the 20th another daughter and her two children will arrive from Buffalo.

  I have to keep the shop open so I can escape to relax once a week!!

 

 

A Little Bit of This and A Little Bit of That

Now I can give you pictures of my life and my knitting recently

In these pictures you'll see the view from the front of the house we rented,

the flowers outside the house,

the top of the mountain the house is on (it's Roan Mt. and the NC/Tenn border runs along the crest

and a restored grist mill.

Grandaughter, Erika, will be one year old on July 25 and I've been working on presents for her.  The green and navy sweater needs a zipper and the orange and pink is a swing top (pinafore) and diaper cover.

And finally, I'm on the home stretch for a cropped tank top model for the shop.

Apologies

I've been back from North Carolina (an absolutely perfect vacation), gone to camp once and to Pa. this past weekend.  I have finished a sweater for Erika's first birthday and made progress on the cotton top-down Aran sweater, but I don't have pix yet.  I promise I'll get them in the next few days. 

Thanks for checking in.

Various & Sundry

  Tomorrow we're leaving for 1 1/2 weeks for a vacation in the mountains of western N. Carolina.  My father's family is from that part of the world and altho there's no longer anyone I know that I'm related to there, I feel a connection to the place.  We've rented a cabin part way up a mountain and 2 daughters, a significant other and 2 friends from Jr. Hi days are going to share the time and the cabin with us.  There's a three stall horse barn on the property, but we haven't found any horses to bring, as yet.

  Before we go I want to do a little catch up since my camera has been with my son for the past two weeks.  A couple of weeks ago I went to a trade show in Sturbridge, Mass with the other local shop owners, my friend, Karin, and another friend, Susan.  We had a wonderful day and I picked up some hand-dyed sock yarn from Carol Martin of Farmhouse Yarns.

 

Then, this week, Lynda Holt, of Ancient Threads brought in some more of her hand-dyed sock yarn that she does with all natural dyes - yummy!

As you can probably tell, the two yarns are sharing one tub!

At the same trade show, I visited, as I always do with Frederikka Payne of Aurora Yarns and a few days ago a package from her arrived with the most incredible yarn in it.  It's called Merino Find and it is preshrunk so it is washer and dryer safe.  It is the springiest, softest yarn I think I've ever felt.

I've e-mailed her asking for two of the variegated shades and 3 complimentary solids for each one. 

I'm leading a Knit-Along through Ravelry for a top down Aran sweater.  We are all having trouble getting gauge.  I thought I had it and had done several inches of the back when I decided that it was just too big so I pulled back to the pick-up stitches on the shoulder, left out two 8 stitch cables and have started over!  I'm supposed to be able to put pictures on Flickr and have them show up on Ravelry but I haven't figured out how, yet, so I'm posting my pictures here.  :)

For those doing this pattern, look closely, at the edge of the neck, Cable A is missing.

Finally, I'm making a tank top out of Dale of Norway's Svale, a blend of cotton, rayon and silk.  It knits into a wonderful fabric, but I do find that there are so many plys in the yarn the it splits rather easily.  The lovely lace pattern at the bottom is repeated once in the front top.

Delivery for Project Linus

The Chicks with Sticks of Glenmont, NY are the greatest!  Three of them arrived yesterday with two large bags of beautiful blankets for Project Linus.  Aren't they wonderful - the ladies and the blankets!!

Oh, I Went to See the Harlot

Oh-h-h, I went to see the Harlot

The wonderful Harlot of Yarn

Because, because, because,

She was talking at Web's!

Actually, Web's sponsored her and she spoke at the Calvin (an old movie theatre in Northampton, MA).  If you click on the picture, you can see the theatre marque annoucing the event.  I, of course, always being organized and on top of things (LOL) forgot my camera, but fortunately and fortuitously when my yarn traveling companion, Tomi) walked to the back of the line who was there but our friend, Karin Maag-Tanchak and her friend, Elise.  She took this picture and she has posted several more on her blog www.knitting-and@blogspot.com.

Stephanie Pearl McPhee (the Harlot) not only kept us laughing (hard), but also gave us some food for thought.  What do you know about alpha, theta, theta and gamma states of the mind? Well, before yesterday afternoon I didn't know anything, either.  Don't know much now, but at least I know they exist!

Tomi & I first shopped at Web's being totally overwhelmed by the crowds.  We quickly decided we didn't want to stand in line to get our pre-purchased books signed.  What's the point?  I don't know that anyone is ever going to see the signature and when I die the kids won't be opening up my books to see if I have any signed copies.  I own one signed knitting book and so far no one has been impressed.

Other highlights of the trip were finding a Whole Food market on the way to Trader Joe's in Hadley, MA and eating delicious lobster rolls from a road side stand.  Tom and I found the place last year and have been thinking about it ever since.  It's not one of those little drive-up, park then later drive-away stands.  It looks totally permanent now.  Anyway, the lobster rolls are delicious and they're only $6.75!! On the Maine coast you can't touch them for that price.

I have yet to tell you about the red hoodie for grandson.  It's almost finished so I'll tell you about it when i take pictures of the completed object.

After a week of absolutely gorgeous weather, I'm glad to see the rain.  The new little plants, just emerging have been very thirsty.

Catch-up Time

Right this minute I'm tired!  The Yarn Shops of Tech Valley Yarn Crawl started this morning - 2 hours earlier than I normally open.  Before I opened I had to go to the store, buy refreshments for the Crawl and prepare a snack table.  Then, for about 4 hours people have been coming in - fortunately not a lot at once because some have really wanted help or to visit.  I'm happy for a little break now since I'll be open 'til 8 this evening.

Anyway, here's what I've been up to.  I finished the Monterey Cardigan from Dolce Handknits. The stitch pattern is tiny bowknots which are fun and easy to do. The color is actually a soft green that doesn't show up well at all in the pictures.  I made it from Julia (Nashua), a blend of alpaca, mohair and wool.

I showed the beginning of the red tank top out of Svale (Dale of Norway).  I've made a little progress on that.  It got pushed aside by the next two projects which were demanding more immediate attention.

On Ravelry (the on-line knitting and crochet community) I am hosting a Knit-Along for an Aran top-down cardigan and as host (leader) I've been knitting swatches (the first set was too big, which really proved a point), studying the pattern and reading up on Aran knitting.  Here are the two swatches for the moss stitch fillers on size 8 (white) and 6(fuchsia)needles.  Believe me, the left edges are lined up so the white protrusion is how much bigger the swatch is on the #8.  It may not be much here, but overall it'll make a big difference.

Once I discovered the moss stitch swatches were different, I redid one of the cable panels and there was an even bigger difference.

The project which has taken the most attention has been a put-off-for-too-long zippered hoodie for my almost 7 year old grandson.  As many of you know, kids can be really picky about their clothes and if they don't like it, they don't wear it.  I hunted and hunted for the perfect pattern with no luck so I finally just decided to go for it and design my own with a little help from a top-down cardigan pattern that had a collar.  That gave me a ball park figure for how many stitches to cast on which I did with a provisional cast-on. 

I'm going to have to continue this later in another posting.  Typepad seems to have reached the end of it's posting length!

Yarn Crawl and Other Important Things

Here's a heads up on the upcoming Yarn Crawl on April 16-19.  This is an opportunity to visit the 5 shops of the Yarn Shop Owners of the Tech Valley Group.  These are BeauKnits on Remsen St. in Cohoes; Brunswick Yarn Depot on Grange Road in Brunswick; Eastside Weavers on Carlyle Ave. in Troy; Trumpet Hill on New Karner Rd.(Rosewood Plaza) in Colonie and Wool 'n Word in West Sand Lake.  At the first shop you visit, when you make a purchase you will receive a 10% off coupon.  Use it at all five shops and it will be enteered into a drawing for a $50 gift certificate good at any of our shops.  No prior registration needed.  If you want more information call me at 674-5096.

I've finished the Short Row Felted purse.  I decided to give it an extreme felting because my girls like small purses.  Once again, here it is unfelted

and here it is felted.

I've almost finished a great sweater jacket and I'll post that picture in a couple of days.  It belongs in the category of 'home' knitting - in other words, I do it at night after the shop closes.  My new shop project is a tank top done in Svale from Dale of Norway and it's a D of N pattern as well. 

There are supposed to be three repeats of the lace pattern but for the sake of speed, I've omitted one repeat.

Short-Row Purse - almost done

The short-row purse that's the subject of the Wed. evening class in April is almost finished.  I have to finish the i-cord bind off, and two i-cord handles - then felting time!

I've also finished a summer hat out of Geranium - a silk, cotton & viscose yarn that's a favorite of mine.

The seed catalogs keep pouring in and I keep looking at the drab scene outside my window, but when I look closely, I'm beginning to see a few signs that plants know that Spring has officially begun - some daffodils are pushing through the ground, the snowdrops are beginning to bloom and the maple trees are beginning to show swellings.  I'm also spotting various birds that have come back already.  The other day I thought it would be nice to warn Jeremy's girlfriend that I have whistling conversations with birds.  I hear them singing away and I whistle back, then they respond and I whistle again.  I keep it up for a while until they or I get tired.  Fortunately, for him, she didn't think this was too crazy!

There are going to be some mini-workshops available at WnW in April.  I've just written them up in an e-mail to my customers and on my website, so instead of repeating myself, I hope you'll read about it in one of the other locations. 

I've Tried Them

I had some time this weekend so I did two of the small socks in the Cat Bordhi book.  She suggests that these will help to understand the principles behind the particular structure.  This little yellow sock was knit from the top down with matching increases down the front (instep), then the heel was knit and finally the rest of the foot and a star toe.  If you don't like a pointy toe, you can use another type.

The red sock is started at the toe with a figure 8 cast-on (explained and illustrated in the book).  The instep (or arch expansion as she calls it) creates a swirling ridge around the sock.  On the adult patterns it continues around the ankle even more. Also, these are two pictures of the same sock.  If I had done a right sock and a left sock the swirl would have gone in two different directions!

A third sockitecture is done from the top down.  I'd already started a sock in the conventional method, but pulled out the heel flap and began the arch expansion by her method which entails two increases every 4th row.  These increases, if I read things right, can be regularly spaced or they can be worked into a pattern.  In this picture you can begin to see the increase.  I have to go from 64 stitches to 94 - I think I'm at about 80.